The Soccer Mom Vote

School is not a sporting event.

On November 6, Utah voters will go to the polls to decide on a statewide school vouchers initiative. It would give families across the state the opportunity to apply for private school vouchers worth  $500 - $3000, depending on family income. As of this writing, the measure looks like it will fail, largely because the public does not want to withdraw money from the public schools, and because voucher proponents have insulted the intelligence of undecided voters by raising the (supposedly frightening) spectre of control of the schools by Ted Kennedy and Nancy Pelosi.

Interestingly, the Utah proposal is one of the few that does not take money out of the public schools, at least not for the first five years. What happens after that isn't specified. The measure is being touted as a way to alleviate overcrowding in the public schools. Utah families have an average 50% more children than the families in the rest of the country, 96% of them attend public schools and the state spends near the bottom per pupil on education. Most voucher and school choice schemes take the "tuition" of a student leaving the district directly out of the sending district's budget. Instead, the Utah measure increases overall school spending to cover the vouchers. Soccer Mom Angela outlines general voucher pros and cons in a non-partisan manner here.

Largely absent from the Utah debate is the usual claim that vouchers will give poverty-level children a better shot at learning. Because they don't, really. Funded at the level that they are, voucher programs not only don't cover the average private school tuition, but they don't even consider the cost of uniforms, textbooks (you buy your own in private school), and transportation. They are, as has been proven by studies of programs like the one in Milwaukee, not a ticket out of the public schools, but a discount for those who have already left or were never there in the first place (over 75% of Milwaukee voucher recipients were already in private school).

Of course the other word that always comes up in these debates is competition - union-based teachers, so goes the claim, don't want competition. Competition would supposedly improve the schools. This sometimes also called choice, as in "vouchers would expand parental choice." Well, I'm all for school choice, I think it's time we acknowledged that one size does not fit all when it comes to learning, but I stop short of supporting vouchers, because as anyone who has been through the rigors of applying for private school knows, the only party with any real choice is the school itself, enrolling and excluding whomever it chooses (for the record, yes, I got in). There are all sorts of reasons that comparing public and private school acheivement doesn't quite compute, but the exclusivity is the big one. The ability to sweep the top tier of talent and put it all one side makes voucher-based competition akin to putting your local high school football team up against the New England Patriots. Somebody call an ambulance.

Sure, some competition in education is healthy, motivational even. There's nothing like a spelling bee, or a science fair, or a DECA compeition to get kids excited to show off their abilities. These kinds of events aren't set up to punish the ones who don't win. Unfortunately, like a lot of the provisions of No Child Left Behind, voucher programs are designed to make even decent public schools look bad in the eyes of the general public.   If we are really serious about improving learning opportunities for children, there's a lot we could learn from the private school environment. That will be the subject of another post next month.

Starting a Chain Reaction

It’s interesting, you know, that despite some major differences in political opinions, many moms are exactly the same in one respect.  You would do just about anything to protect your children.

Without writing a lot of things that would be horrifically embarrassing for my oldest son (because eventually, he may actually be able to find this on the internet…when he’s an adult and I don’t watch every tiny click of the mouse over his shoulder while I protect him from online predators…but I digress), I’ll just say he’s in middle school and let you get the picture from there.  (I've already talked about him before a bit.)

It’s a socially awkward and painful time for a lot of kids.  I remember times of angst and uncertainty myself, and, well, it was a pretty long time ago!  What I’m trying to say is, I send four children out the door to school in the morning and along with all the reading, writing and arithmetic, I say a silent prayer that nobody is mean to them, hurts their feelings, makes their day bad, etc.  I know that I can’t protect those emotional wounds they may feel at being slighted by a classmate, and people not liking you is a part of life.  But I can’t help but think, hey, that’s my child’s heart your stepping on with your hurtful words.

It is also a hard lesson to teach your child to have compassion for people that are not nice to them.  To be the bigger person, to respect somebody who doesn’t deserve it.

That’s why, last winter, I started information gathering about what happens, specifically, in our school but really, everywhere with regards to what schools do to protect our children when “boys will be boys” steps over the line.  Anti-bullying legislation is in effect in, according to one source, 32 states.  I was also interested specifically in what the school system itself does with regards to bullying in its student conduct policies.  (And I'm in no way indicating that bullying only happens with boys, just to clarify).

But those things, while necessary, does the fact that an anti-bullying law exists deter kids from being cruel to each other?  My own assumption was that it probably does not. 

Therefore, I had heard about Rachel’s Challenge and was so impressed and moved by the power of the program that I wanted it to be at our school as soon as I could figure out how to convince other people to support the idea.  They had reached ten million school kids last year alone, and I wanted to bring this message to our schools as well.

I talked at length with the Rachel’s Challenge people.  Then I knew I needed to have the middle school principal on board with the idea because if he didn’t care or think we needed it, the idea was probably dead in the water.  He loved it.  So we pounced on the superintendent of schools.  He, too, was impressed and also offered up an earmarked school fund that could handle the cost.  Which was great, because I was prepared to fundraise the $7000 cost to bring it to the public and also the private school myself if I had to.

Long story short, Rachel’s Challenge was held at our middle school Monday with both the private and public school kids there together.  These kids were, at the oldest, Kindergarteners when the tragedy at Columbine occurred.  Their point of reference was nonexistent.  But for an hour long program given by a survivor of that horrible day, they were completely silent and moved to tears.  Six hundred plus kids, rapt attention, watching the tragic series of events unfold thru video presentations were realizing that no school is exempt from tragedy.

I thought of all you other Soccer Moms when there was a press interview beforehand and the journalist wanted information about how I found out about the program.  It went a little something like this...

"Last year, I was thinking ahead to having a child in middle school and the thought of how challenging these years might be for him was keeping me awake at night."
"Let me get this straight, you lay awake at might worrying about your kid being in middle school?"
"Yeah, actually, I do."
"Why?"
"Because I'm a mom, that's my job."

Rachel’s Challenge, specifically is:

• Eliminate Prejudice by looking for the best in others
• Dare to Dream – set goals – keep a journal
• Choose Your Influences – input determines output
• Kind Words – small acts of kindness=huge impact
• Start a Chain Reaction with family and friends

Rachel’s Challenge is non-religious, non-political, and non-profit.  I try my hardest to teach my kids tolerance and respect and this program reinforced those viewpoints already held.  But in a selfish way, I hope that a child who has no positive role models, or has people in their lives teaching bigotry and hatred, maybe, just maybe, that child gleaned something positive and will think before they lash out at my child, or yours.

Rachel's Challenge
BullyPolice
NEA Support of Anti-Bullying Legislation

On the Separation of Sports from School

Students returning to school next month will be greeted by the results of budget decisions made last Spring. For some lucky kids, that may mean new computers in the library, a fresh coat of paint in their classroom, or a new piece of equipment in their chemistry lab. But for many, last year's budget means fewer electives, another year with outdated textbooks and computers, increased athletic fees, and in some drastic cases, the decimation of the school's entire athletic program.

Pay-to-play didn't exist when I was in high school, it was introduced a few years after I left and was quite controversial back then. Should students have to bear the cost of any part of public school? What about the families who couldn't afford the fees, would they be shut of competition, out of college resume building opportunities? Athletic fees are more widely accepted now, and for years there have been efforts to "cover" the expenses of poorer families and a family cap has kept the fees for multi-sport kids and multi-sibling families reasonable. But this year many of those family caps are disappearing. 

As more and more athletic budgets are covered outside the school budget through fees, donations, student fundraising, and gate receipts, there is reason to believe that those items will never be returned to the public school budget. Every year, as area communities hash out the budget or contemplate a budget override, there are letters to the editor proclaiming sports, music, and art to be frills that should be cut in the name of belt-tightening and fiscal responsibility. Or worse, they are labeled time-wasters in an era when academic achievement is so poor.

Many of us writing here are, or will be, actual soccer moms; driving our kids to sport practice and cheering them on while they play. Until they reach HS, age, a lot of this will be paid for with out of pocket fees to organizations outside the school. The fees are generally nominal, and we use this time to help our children explore their interests, so they can choose a sport to tryout for when tryouts count. How much of a difference is it going to make later if we pay sports fees to the school, a town Rec department, or a private organization? We could remove sports from the school budget altogether, but should we? 

There are many teachers, parents and athletes who passionately believe that offering these choices as an educational institution is a part of educating the whole child and that stripping these activities from the school budget, or charging for them, is only going the exacerbate the growing opportunity gap between rich and poor.

I never played sports in school and athletics to me were a major contributing factor in the social stratification of high school, but I also know that the attraction of playing sports helps keep some kids motivated and disciplined in other areas when little else works. And with obesity rising, should we really be limiting physical activity in a school setting more than it already is?

I know a few sports parents who would like to see a general activities fee charged to those kids who are in the chess club or the student council, since those also have an impact on the budget in the form of stipends paid to the teachers who sponsor or monitor those groups. But's there's a rather cynical saying that goes something like this: "Cut an activity or an AP class and no one will notice, but cut sports and people will start to howl." In other words, in order for people to care about the budget, they have to feel some pain.

Education is only going to get more expensive to do right, and every year it bugs me to listen to people decrying sports fees while begrudging teachers a 2-3 percent raise. Really! What is it about an annual raise for a public employee that is so offensive?

Education is difficult because we can't all agree on what it means. Reading, writing, 'rithmetic? Enrichment? Employment? Academics? Athletics?

What does it mean to prepare students to participate in society, and are sports a worthy contribution to their development and our society as a whole?

Go Maryland!

An email came to my box a few weeks ago via a homeschooling email list that I had joined with a view to going on some cool field trips.   I was not aware that the group was a "ministry" of a particular church; when I was sent an email about it inviting me to join on another group it was not couched in those terms (which I believe was a bit deceptive), but after looking at the group's home page I just unsubscribed from it without further protest.  The assumption was that this story was so obviously outrageous and disgusting that we would all immediately take up the cause of fighting this outrage.  What outrage, you ask?

Well, as part of a two part sex education lesson aimed at 8 and 10th graders, totaling 90 minutes, the Maryland State Board of Education will be incorporating the concept that homosexuality is not abnormal or deviant.  And there will be an dvd on the proper use of a condom.  The email I got was full of outrage about the "promotion of homosexuality in the classroom" and the curriculum's "expressed hostility toward Christianity" (the capital "c" is a quote, not how I would write the word).  There was concern that the "Maryland curriculum could become the model for promoting the homosexual lifestyle in public schools across the nation."  Keep in mind that students need the written permission of a parent to even attend these classes.  I just fail to make the intellectual leap from the viewpoint that homosexuality is not deviant to promotion of it.  Does addressing the educational needs of the homosexual in school promote homosexuality?  According to these people (the American Family Association), yes, but it seems like quite a leap to me.

I am happy to see schools address the educational needs of the students.  Many 8th graders, unfortunately, should know how to use a condom unless we want them becoming parents or contracting STDs.  And for the parents who don't want normalization of homosexuality or sex education, don't sign the permission slip.  I want to believe that the ideal of abstinence education really works, I really believe that teenagers are having sex way too young, no matter what their sexual orientation, and a lot more of them than anyone wants to admit.  But my observation is that it's not working.  And I would rather that if they are going to be sexually active, they know how to put a condom on properly.  And if they're gay and sexually active I would rather that they were confident enough about it to use a condom and not feel shame about it.

As I stand two years plus into the parenting journey, I am terrified about all the stuff I will have to deal with, I worry about keeping my daughter safe in her teenage years.  But I don't think keeping her ignorant or teaching her bigotry is a smart or effective way to help her stay safe.

What Happened to an Apple for the Teacher?

I’m going to make this post short.  Because it’s almost the weekend, it’s summer, and you Soccer Moms out there are busy.

Next month, at least in my neck of the woods, we’ll be heading back to school.  Despite the crazy pace of summer, I am relieved of the usual school angst like bullies, teacher compatibility, and wondering if they’re eating one tiny scrap of what’s served in the cafeteria. I have yet another reason to worry.

My MIL called me alarmed one morning (that’s what she does best) regarding a news story where a 14-year old who was on ADD medication had gotten an energy drink (like Red Bull or something) out of the vending machine at school thinking it was soda and had what amounted to a mild heart attack. Now, I have not been able to find this story, it would have been early April.  (If anyone sees it, please let me know and I’ll update the post with the link).

However, the point of the story is: why do our schools need to have energy drinks in their vending machines? I’m not exempt from a history of trying to get an energy boost.  There weren’t energy drinks when I was in high school, but there was Vivarin and my friends and I would pop those during semester test weeks to pull all nighters. But it wasn’t in the vending machine in study hall or the cafeteria.  The biggest threat to our health in the vending machine was soda. While I realize a 14-year old should be old enough to know the difference between a can of soda and an energy drink, well, I guess I just know my own son who is going into middle school this year and he pays no attention to anything like that.  And what if he was on a medication that would have dangerous results from mixing with an energy drink?  Do I need to remind him every morning before he leaves for school to make sure he avoids those options in the cafeteria?

Your thoughts?  Should schools be held to a higher standard with their snack food options? Or is it perfectly harmless to have Red Bull, Rock Star and other energy drinks available?

My opinion is that with my tax dollars, I think there are a sufficient number of healthy options my children can have.  I’d rather not worry if, in a more idiotic moment of peer pressure, they spend an entire study hall in a Red Bull slamming contest with their friends.  I try to teach them to make smart choices, but I guess I’d rather not have that particular temptation available at school.

Some sources:
Energy drink gave teens heart palpitations
Energy drinks' caffeine buzz can land the unwary in the ER
Docs worry about kids buzzed on energy drinks
School Tells Energy Drinks to Buzz Off

 

Seeing summer red

My son turned five this past weekend. Five. That's a pretty big milestone in my book. So much changes in a young life at five.

Except sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes those changes wait until six.

As a parent I was prepared to be open minded about when I sent my child off to kindergarten. I was ready to keep him in preschool one more year if we felt he wasn't quite 'ready.' We weren't looking at his birth date. We weren't looking at his ability to read or add and subtract. We were looking at how he handled the variety of school related 'things' that involve social and emotional maturity.

I assumed it was our choice to make - a choice we'd make based on recommendations from his preschool. What I wasn't prepared for was the 'helpful' input and unsolicited advice we'd get from everyone and anyone. When it comes to the topic of "redshirting" - a term borrowed from the scholastic sports world referring to keeping a child back a year to give them an 'edge' - people seem quick to make assumptions.

"Oh, a June birthday," said one mother with a knowing nod of her head. "And a boy at that. So you're holding him back right? I mean those summer boys, wow. Keeping my summer boy out a year was the best thing we ever did..."

Another mother, whose son also has a summer birthday, rolled her eyes. She had actually been advised by the preschool to consider delaying her son's entry into kindergarten a year. She was determined to send him simply based on the fact that he made the district's arbitrary cut-off date. "He'll be fine. He'll catch up," she said.

It's not that I doubt either of them, at least not exactly. I do, however, think there's a major issue with the all or nothing/face-value approach.

The National Center for Education Statistics estimates that approximately 10 percent of 5 year olds are being 'redshirted.'  The trend has spurned a rash of articles and studies - just in the last month CBS News covered it, the NY Times Magazine covered it, along with a whole host of local newspapers in both big and small markets.

What does all that mean? Well, it means that it is a hot issue for at least the one year it impacts you directly. Do you send or not?

There are a host of reasons to hold a child out the extra year. Some seemingly practical and well thought out - emtional or social readiness, for example. Others, completely arbitrary - a matter of a date on the calender, future advantage in size, percieved 'leg up'.

As I said, we had been open to waiting the extra year. Our district, currently, abides by a "five by October 1st" cut-off requirement. My son turned five on June 30th. By age alone he's eligible to attend. Our district does not require readiness screenings or evaluations - simply being of age is enough.

We watched our son closely for cues. We talked to his teachers. We observed him in other settings with his peers. We decided he was ready. The calender never came up in our conversation.

And that, to me, is the way it should be.

If you take one thing from this today - just one morsel - let it be this and let it apply across the board for you, not just school readiness. As parents we ought not ever make a decision based on some stat or some standard. Heck, whether it be for our children, for ourselves or in the voting booth, due diligence and introspection is a must.

When I put my marketing hat on, I'm sometimes called upon to order little 'give-away' items -- anything you can stick a logo on is good. The promo-item people will tell you to always order extra-large when you're giving away t-shirts. "Don't mess with sizes. Get the XL. It's pretty much a one-size fits all world, out there," one of them once told me.

And yet in reality, even with those t-shirts, it's NEVER one size fits all.

SHOULD SCHOOLBUSES HAVE SEATBELTS?

Hello everyone! This is my first post as a contributing writer wearing jersey #1. I'm an American ex pat living in Montreal, and have a plethora of interesting anecdotes to share after having lived in Canada for the past 12 years. I'm just so excited that I must take a swig of Gatorade before I can continue... much better.

Ok, so what I am passionate about exploring today is based on a hair-raising experience I had last week as a parent volunteer for my daughter's daycare field trip to a "Cabane a Sucre" (which is French for "Sugaring Off" - it's a big feast in the woods to celebrate the season of taking the maple out of the trees to make maple syrup). I told the daycare my daughter could go only if i was able to be one of the parent volunteers, because I wanted to BE WITH HER in whatever vehicle was taking the group to this event.

It turned out to be a big, yellow bus... which immediately conjured intensely fond memories of my childhood -- waving bye bye to my mother on the farm in Seattle as I boarded the bus for my first day of school...  drawing "Mr. Chinnigan" on the chins of my track & field teammates on the bus home after winning a track meet in Oregon years later in high school... the memories are many and wonderful.

But now I'm a MAMA, with a two year-old daughter that I would instantly throw myself in front of said yellow bus for in a nano second for, in order to protect her fragile, innocent life. And this mama, who also saw the movie "The Sweet Hereafter" (don't ask me to tell you what happened with a yellow school bus -- too traumatic to recount), suddenly finds herself in charge of two toddlers on this big, yellow bus cruising down the highway at 100 kilometeres (that's 55 miles) per hour to a nearby town about 30 minutes drive from Montreal.

Suddenly I feel absolutely helpless, and simultaneously memories are conjured in my minds eye of two major car accidents I endured as a passenger, in vehicles that rolled several times and threw me around like a rag doll because I was not wearing a seatbelt at the time (young and stupid). It was a miracle I survived either accident, but I did. And I still have the muscle memory of those accidents, and the slow motion video of each accident is somehow permanently imprinted in my mind... especially the moment when one vehicle was rolling and i remember my hands touching soft, wet grass (obviously the window had broken out), and the helpless realization that I was going to be thrown outside and crushed by the rolling vehicle. But somehow I was not.

I recount this memory because it would NOT leave my mind as I smiled and sang and giggled with my daughter and her friend that I was "in charge of" as a parent volunteer for this field trip. I could not stop thinking about how I KNEW I could do nothing to protect them if this bus were to get in an accident, that they AND I would be catapulted in violent ways that I knew too well. I could not believe I had allowed myself and my daughter to be sitting on this big, yellow bus and swore I would only do such an event in the future if I followed the bus in my van, where I could seatbelt my daughter into her car seat.

But we were already enroute on the highway, where everyone was singing songs and laughing, so I just prayed like crazy that all would be well. I wondered about the other parents of these toddlers, who let their child go on this trip without them, and I couldn't believe it. I chatted with another mother next to me who told me one child she was in charge of had just told her that her father burned her with a cigarette that morning, and I could see the cigarette burn on her hand as she gazed out the window. My thoughts left the seatbelt issue for a few moments as I fantasized about what I would do to this father to make him pay for such a horrific act upon his innocent daughter. But that's a whole other blog entry...

So when all is said and done, we survived the day and made it home safely, but ultimately, I ask:  SHOULD SCHOOLBUSES HAVE SEATBELTS?

My answer is an unequivocal YES, but then how do you police the kids to actually put them on, and KEEP them on? How do you help them take OFF the seatbelts in an accident to get out, if there is only one bus driver (in most cases of school bus journeys) or just a few adults?

If anyone has a creative solution, I'm all ears!

Autism Awareness

This post isn’t political as such, but just a reminder, really.  When it comes to some things, whether directly affected or not, it never hurts to educate yourself.  Be informed.  Be aware.

April is Autism Awareness Month.  Any regular readers of my personal blog will know that I have an autistic brother.  It is with great pride and amazement when I am able to share certain pieces of his story with my readers.  The posts about Joe and his accomplishments get some of the most positive and thoughtful responses of anything I blog about.  If you’re interested, you can read a bit about his story here and here.

When he was finally diagnosed with autism at nearly four years old, the doctors told us, his family, that the incidence of autism was 1 in 10,000.  Now, I’m reading reports that suggest this statistic is 1 in 150.  What is going on here?  Are the reports wrong or is autism reaching epidemic proportions?

I’ve always been vigilant about educating myself about autism.  I give a significant portion of my charity dollars to autism research.  If I have a torch to carry for anything, autism is it.  And I’d be remiss in not using a great forum like The Soccer Mom Vote to be heard.

Anyway, I don’t have anything fascinating or profound to say, just reminding you about Autism Awareness and offering multiple links so that, if you’ve got five or ten minutes, educate yourself.

Autism Research Institute - (I send my donations here)

Autism Awareness

Autism Speaks

Take your tweezers to the sand

When I was in 8th grade I won a blue ribbon in the school science fair. This was huge! Not only was it a ticket to the state wide competition, but let's be honest, I'm more of a 'liberal arts' kind of girl. This was a coup!

The state fair lifted a bit of that pre-teen veil of naivete from my eyes. There I was with the hypothesis I conceived and tested next to the kid whose parents had more input on his display than he did. For the record, neither of us won the competition, but that really isn't the point.

Last year my son started tip-toeing closer to his own days of science fair participant -- he entered preschool. I figured we had time before the parental homework patrol stepped on board. I was wrong. The school hosted a big birthday bash for Frosty the Snowman. In order to properly celebrate, each student was asked to create his/her own snowman with the assistance of his/her family. Our creation looked like the swamp-monster met snow. It was unique and it was clearly child led. When hung amongst the other contributions it's uniqueness became even more evident - I stopped counting how many of those snow people were clearly made by mom and her scrapbooking supplies when I hit two dozen. The school has about 400 students in total.

The day of Frosty's party, I sat amongst a crowd of family and friend filing in and ease dropped on the conversation behind me in spite of myself. "Wow, look at that hula dancer. I thought mine was good, but that one puts me to shame...Oh, I mean ours, mine and Junior's...our snowman," said one mom. She was not the only one muttering the same dismay.

I see the same thing in my two-year-old's mom-and-me classes. "No, no, does a bunny have purple ears? No, use the pink for the inside. Bunnies have pink inside, white or brown on the outside," one mom hissed at her child today as she seized a crayon and began coloring the rabbit ears herself.

What is it these parents hope to gain by taking control for the sake of perfection?

I don't think there's much in life that can't be improved upon. Clearly, no matter how good or bad our educational system is, we can always do better. We can explore new methods. We can widen our offerings. We can tack on more days, more hours, more play, more subjects, more choice, less of any/all of the above or whatever it is we think will create better, more well rounded students.

And yet it's not enough. It can't be enough if we leave it all there for the 'system' to take control of.

I'm not advocating homeschooling, although I do think it's a great opportunity for some families. I'm talking about taking an active role in education beyond making sure our kids get on the bus in the morning. . .but falling short of doing it for them. It's not about giving the answers. It's helping children find the right tools. It's about reinforcing and complimenting, not doing it for them.

The truth is I don't want to talk about parenting meets teaching. I want to talk about responsibility - as in it's become so easy today to lay the blame at someone else's feet whilst taking the credit for ourselves. I don't doubt, for example, that the parents in the above scenarios will wonder, at some point, where the system failed the child that can't seem to effectively problem solve. It won't occur to them that taking over in the name of perfection may have handicapped their child's own growth.

It's become easy to see the big picture and ask "What can *they* do to fix it?" when we ought to break things down to "What can I do to contribute?"

Sometimes our own individual efforts are like plucking sand from a beach with a tweezer. Understandably, we become easily consumed with the fear of being overwhelmed that we step back and start demanding the back-hoe dig us out on our own behalf.

Reality, however, is that when enough people start combing the sand things start to change - feel free to call it grass roots. And, the truth is sometimes these bottom up efforts really are about influencing the top to move it's lumbering self into action to conquer what the bottom alone can not. Other times it's about sending a ripple effect into motion so that the top changes in spite of itself.

Irregardless, the point is simply this - when we begin to sit back and find the things "they" must change, our next step ought to be discovering where we can being the metamorphosis. It may be writing long, winding editorial pieces on blogs like this or it may be helping a child find their educational success through their own voice as we mentor.

That's my challenge to us all today. Take inventory of what issues mean the most to you - what changes you yearn most for. Where can *you* begin to make an impact?